BENGALURU: A business executive suspected to be a recruiter for the Islamic State (IS) terror group was arrested here on Saturday, police said.
"We picked up terror suspect Mehdi Masroor Biswas from his house in the early hours and took him into custody for interrogation," Karnataka Director General of Police (DGP) L.R. Pachuau told IANS.
A preliminary inquiry by police zeroed in on Biswas, 24, who works as an executive at a prominent Indian corporate and stays in Bengaluru's upscale southeast suburb.
A probe team of the city's special crime branch raided Biswas' house and seized incriminating documents, Islamic literature and many pictures.
"Biswas, who hails from West Bengal, moved to Bengaluru after his transfer a couple of years ago. A case has been registered against him under the Information Technology Act," Additional Commissioner of Police Alok Kumar said.
Meanwhile, the Times of India quoted the DGP as saying that Masroor has confessed.
"Mehdi Masroor has confessed that he was operating the ISIS Twitter account, @ShamiWitness," DGP Pachuau told mediapersons in a press conference.
Biswas has been booked under Section 125 of IPC for waging war against any Asiatic power in alliance with the government of India, the report stated. “Masroor used to attended office in the day and operate his Twitter account in night,” the DGP said.
A British news channel Thursday reported from London that Biswas was part of the IS terror group's Twitter activities and was regularly tweeting from the city.
"Mehdi's tweets from his Twitter handle (@shamiwitness) were most popular among British IS supporters," Channel 4 News said in its report unmasking Biswas' terror activity.